Ctp Competition Rule Discussion..

[Gavrushka]

The language interpreter displayed a white flag on attempted translation of that one J Bytherway

Am I right in thinking that what you are suggesting (and forgive the imprecise attempted maths terminology) that the map will be an equalised start loc, but with a translation of terrain west to east or east to west, so whereas players will not be immediately opposite each other, they will be on exactly the same terrain to start with - I DO like that idea, and look forward to seeing the result.

[yoda]

Map

Originally posted by Gavrushka
J Bytheway - Quinns is the guy that will be able to help us load a map online -
- I think we should first get all three maps played online and see how they compare - I suggest a few EXTRA days to get us up to speed on not just what the maps look like but HOW they play too -

Please, someone ask Quinns or get him to post just how to move the map to the MP environment. I have already started play testing my map as a single player and have Dr. Doom/Paul/Dragon who wouldn't mind testing it as MP. We just need to get it to that stage.

As a single player map, the one I've created presents a lot of challenges. Empire expansion is manditory to get the goods, but the starting point makes the choices very open. Because the empire needs to be spred out, empire size is a significant factor. Also, a lot of key goods for making those extra monopolies are on the middle islands which makes for some very interesting logistics. The starting places are far enough apart that the alien option is realistic as a quick military victory would be very difficult (but no impossible). Sea is extremely important, but to conquer your opponent you will need to be able to land a significant invasion force as a good number of cities will be interior.

I created the land symmetical as I believe it is manditory to provide both players with the exact same situation. After all, it's a test of skill and what better way to test skill than to give both players the exact same tools to work with.

yoda

[Gavrushka]

Yoda, that is what J Bytheway is doing - an equlaised map, but one that does not LOOK symmetrical - I think we will be using all these maps for some time to come, and I think careful consideration has to be given to them . And I think once we know how to load game as MP we got to play test the hell out of them all and make an informed decision.

[J Bytheway]

Just had a look at Yoda's map, and I am impressed. Unfortunately I have a habit of seeing all the things that clash with my sense of rightness, like the river that flows over a lake, but nonetheless I can see it was a lot of work and it's well done. It certainly achieved your aims as you set them out in that last post.

It occured to me that the big question is: Do people want to start connected by land? I made mine with a connection since that seemed to be the consensus opinion at the time, but Yoda's clearly doesn't. I think I'm somewhat turned around to the seperate landmasses point of view (not that I really had an opinion in the first place...). I was planning on a rather long, tortuous connection between the players on my new map, but now I'm not so sure. I'll see how it turns out.

Gav: The glide reflection I'm using basically means this:
If you take the map, reflect it in the equator and shift the whole lot to the east (or west) by half the map width then you interchange the players, but change none of the terrain. As you point out, this gives the players identical terrain with non-opposite start locs. Yoda also achieved this via a rotation, but I wanted to avoid that because of what happens in the middle of the map.

Lots of choices is the key, right? I'll try to keep that in mind.

[Gavrushka]

Here is MY idea of the brief (yoda please post too)

The players must be far apart.

There must be no obvious direction that the players should take to develop civ (like an obvious high prod centre or a plethora of goods in one area of the map)

There should be some central area to fight over with high prod, goods and growth tiles which is big enough and wide enough so that the player who starts the game is not at an advantage from starting and colonising this area first.

I personally feel there should be a land route between the two nations as otherwise it is exclusively the preserve of the Sea Captains - control the sea and win the game kind of thing...

I think there should be no obvious route from player A to Player B - for instance if there is a single land route, you know where to defend.

I feel there should be MANY very high prod smaller islands that will take two - five cities to create highly difficult to capture fortified cities if a player chooses to do so - PURE mountains

I think that about 30% of the territory should be land and that the continents of the North and South should occupy a significant part of that 30% .

I think that there should always be access to water (river or sea) within 8 squares of any location on land - the reason being it means that the opposition cannot second guess where the city locs would be - as per first suggestion.

I think that the map shoud be prepared to allow any length of game... Even Genetic or Diamond - I doubt things will go that far ... BUT after the comp I think it would be nice to have the map available still for other games.... So Sea Colonisation with ample sea goods should be considered.

It would also be good if we could use Keygen Mod Lite online, again Super Settlers would mean the start locations were diversified IF the player so wished.

I also want to make one more suggestion after a game I had recently - I think all players should start with Theocracy.... in the last game I played religion simply would not come up for 20 turns or so! - but that was compounded by finding tech in ruins- maybe ruined research paths??

Man I am looking forward to this!!!

Yoda can you get the rest of the bunch to start posting ideas?? This discussion is limited if we don't all contribute.

Pin? can we play online sometime??

[yoda]

Map Design

Here are just some thoughts on map design:

If the two players are connected by land, you virtually eliminate the necessity for all sea units from the game. Yes, they can be used to control the land bridge or to try an end run invasion, but basically, land units rule. Additionally, how many times have you used an aircraft carrier? Air power can be a critical component to winning a CTP game, and if there are lots of little islands around, everything is land based. In other words, having land bridges and/or lots of little islands around means it's easier for people to conduct a campaign. In my opinion, if you make it so that all of the CTP units have to be considered you have now found the path for finding who is the best CTP player.

If there is not enough land in a game then sea rules. Land units become useless and the game focusses solely on naval conquest. Once again, I don't think this route would find the best CTP players.

If there are not enough goods around to make science advancement a reality, you basically say you want the game to end in a massive conflict. Same goes if there are too many goods. Science becomes the only focus and the military game becomes obsolete (units become obsolete by science too quickly for any successful campaign to be launched).

Same goes for production. You have to have enough mountains around to allow for production but not enough to make pure land based production the game winning formula.

Creating a map, in my opinion, has to take a great deal of factors into consideration. Starting distances, even terrain, etc... can be argued for many days/weeks on this forum and nobody would have concensus. After all, everyone has their own idea of just what makes good ground (and what helps their style of playing as well... LOL).

I say that as long as all components of CTP (stealth, land, sea, production, science, growth) are required to win, you have a good map. Make it challenging for logistics and robust enough to provide the opportunity for a multiple of choices.

But all of this is academic if we can't find a way to take a scenario map and turn it into a MP game... LOL

yoda

[Gavrushka]

I am gonna try load the map now as an MP - BUT I think one thing is starting to become evident - We play on more than one map.... Yeh it will take longer... But I think maybe with 12 Players - each playing 22 games, or POSSIBLY even 33 on 2 or 3 maps of different kind we should see a fairer result - The games will not take as long as typical games on huge or giga maps- as we will know the lay of tha land, and won't be on Goody hut hunts....

[Gavrushka]

I am doing SOMETHIN wrong... the only scenario I see is the example one - I tried loading it as normal MP - and got scenario not found error.... I tried the directory structure suggested... IS there anyone with technical ability to help out....

[quinns]

You just have to copy the files to your C: drive exactly as described there. In the example, I set up the sym4way_c.csg map. You can exchange the map, but you have to open the new map in cheat mode, then "Save Scenario As" and remember what you name it. You have to change the SCENARIO.TXT file in line one to match this name exactly. Right now, that name is "sym4way_c". Also, you have to copy over the savegame.csg file with whatever file you saved it to when you "Saved Scenario As". That is, go to the C:\Program Files\Activision\Civilization-Call To Power\ctp_program\ctp\save\games\Sennac (for example), change the file name there to "savegame.csg" and overwrite the file under the C:\Program Files\Activision\Civilization-Call To Power\scenarios\MyScenarioPack\scen0000 folder called savegame.csg. I'm sure you all will figure it out. See attached files for assistance. Good luck.

[quinns]

Here are the screen shots to help you set up your C: drive with the custom map. Once you successfully "Load Scenario" from the multiplayer screen, you should see My Scenario Pack and the Description of the scenario (that you wrote in the SCENARIO.TXT file on line two). Line one must be the name of whatever you saved the scenario as.

[Gavrushka]

Thank you very very much - this was all going nowhere fast! It is amazing that for years we have all been playing on random maps, and we could have been playing this way!! Superb!!!!

[Solver]

Some bastard crashed Apolyton for me.

I like Gav's points on map, especially about islands, and my opinion is that a connection by landbridge is needed - such as in map by Quinns.

Also, my opinion is NO mods, and NO starting tech - standard start conditions.

[Patryn]

I think that we should play on multiple maps against multiple times against the opponents. That would give the best result. Also, it would give a more interesting league, since we would get rematchas, and revenge, for the stupid mistakes that we may have made in the last game with that person.

[Gavrushka]

It becomes more evident Patryn that one game between two people is not enough... It would be great to see someone test the maps now we know how- I think the games will be MUCH quicker than random maps....

[Pin]

Gav sure we can play, got my iso so have installed ctp, but need an new server.dat file as i cant get any servers up here

Maybe its my firewall(will look into that after i have tried an new server.dat file :=)


but im very busy with work in may but i should be able to squize in an game or two